I'm no fan of Sarah Silverman (politically) and tend to think her humor as a standup comedian relies too heavily on being blunt and crass. But when people do great things, you encourage it and spread that message.

Someone on Twitter responded to her in a way that was crude and, unfortunately, too expected these days on social media.

Instead of blocking the guy or retorting with some online snark along the lines of "Nice Twitter Account you have there, must be nice to have 14 followers" or "Typical White cis-male response, yo!", Silverman looked into the guys timeline and responded with empathy. The back and forth looks like this:

I not only oppose government welfare, I oppose private welfare. You'd be better off burning your money than giving it to a person who lacks the drive to provide themselves opportunities. At least burning it would provide you some heat.

For the last 9 years, I've been living with poor people. Why? I rent out the spare room in my home, because I'm extroverted and like having some extra spending cash. Every single one of them has been lazy and stupid.

I recall one had tickets to Lollapalooza. She paid $50 each for them. They were selling for $300 each on StubHub. Her boss wouldn't give her the day off. What'd she do? Well, not the smart thing, which is go to work and sell the tickets. Nope, she calls in sick! Yeah, I'm sure that won't be remembered come raise or layoff time.

Another had to borrow money from me every year for his girlfriend's birthday. Same girlfriend. Three years in a row.

Sure, he always paid it back promptly, but seriously.... It happens on the same day every year!

My current tenant is two months behind on rent. I offered to knock off $150 if he raked the leaves and cleaned the gutters (a $60 value). Guess what hasn't happened a month later? Guess who won't be making any more generous offers of work in lieu of rent? (Seriously, if you're looking to hire anyone in the Lake Worth area, check with me first to make sure you don't hire the guy.)

He's a tow truck driver, who gets paid on commission (using his bosses equipment). He was complaining about not getting paid to be on call. I suggested he should go to his boss and ask how he could be of greater use to his boss.

Explain to his boss he wants to make more money, but he understands he needs to provide value to his boss, so he is respectfully asking his boss for help in becoming a more useful employee. He looked at me like I had grown two heads. Then he went into a screed about how it isn't fair he doesn't get paid by the hour (even though his boss only gets paid a flat rate per tow).

No matter how much you help these people, they will always be poor. They squander every opportunity you give them, ignore any advice you give them, and only ever think of their own short term pleasure. We should do away with all forms of charity, with the possible exception of work internships. Work opportunities will separate the wheat from the chafe. Let the rest die face down in the gutter. At least then we'd get soap and glue when we rendered down their bodies. (There's a touch of sarcasm in this paragraph... you know, for effect)

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go stand on my porch and yell at children to get off my lawn.

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Imagine a time before kings, presidents, or prime ministers, before the formation of society
and civilization.

This is what philosophers call a "state of nature". In this thought experiment, people lived freely, without rules or formal laws.

But what exactly does this state look like?

For 17th century philosopher Thomas Hobbes the state of nature is a war of all against all. Mankind’s basic nature is fear, insecurity, death, and turmoil. And from this constant terror, People decided to surrender some basic rights to a sovereign entity, or what he called The Leviathan.

If one was, say, fed up with the theft of his potions, the state could pass laws to protect his goods or help him receive some sort of reparation. This protection is important for a number of reasons, but the most significant is that laws, and their enforcement, keep constant anxiety at bay.

For 18th century Swiss-born french philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the state of nature is rather different than that conceived by Hobbes.

Rousseau sees natural man as independent, solitary, and peaceful. Rousseau thought people were much better off without government. With the creation of agriculture, private property, and the division of labor, however, came inequalities. Unequal access to resources created tension, enmity, and envy.

People started to become aware of their limited material situation and lack of upward mobility. They became aware of their 'unfreedom'. This led Rousseau to claim that “Man is born free and is everywhere in chains.”

While both philosophers describe the state of nature as a sort of beastly existence absent any morality, they disagree on some fundamentals. Rousseau sees the Hobbesian model as leading to despotism, in which people have no choice but to turn to a third party to secure basic needs. Consequently, they do not freely choose their leaders.

Rousseau argues that rather than choosing leaders out of fear, people choose to give up some power and rights, at least so that citizens can be equal. Rousseau dictated that decisions ought to be made for the sake of everyone, instead of a few. This would require that people follow a rule of law that they would follow on their own anyway. For Rousseau, people are better without government because society means unfreedom and oppression.

Whether out of fear or for the sake of equality, the consent to be ruled is called the social contract.

So listeners I ask, “Who has it right?”
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Do people need to be kept in line or should they remain free to do as they wish?

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We are a monthly book club for anyone who wants to learn more about Libertarianism. We will discuss each book's chapter/section in separate posts, so everyone will be able to read along at their own pace. We typically also focus on books which are available for free so that everyone can participate.

Liberalism is Mises's classic statement in defense of a free society, one of the last statements of the old liberal school and a text from which we can continue to learn. It has been the conscience of a global movement for liberty for 80 years. This new edition, a gorgeous hardback from the Mises Institute, features a new foreword by Tom Woods. It can also be downloaded here.

Ch1, pgs. 18 -26
From Tom Wood's Forward:
“The liberal sets a very high threshold for the initiation of violence. Beyond the minimal taxation necessary to maintain legal and defense services—and some liberals shrink even from this— he denies to the state the power to initiate violence and seeks only peaceful remedies to perceived social ills. He opposes violence for the sake of redistributing wealth, of enriching influential pressure groups, or trying to improve man’s moral condition. Civilized people, says the liberal, interact with each other not according to the law of the jungle, but by means of reason and discussion.”

Intro. Mises:
“If it is maintained that the consequence of a liberal policy is or must be to favor the special interests of certain strata of society, this is still a question that allows of discussion. It is one of the tasks of the present work to show that such a reproach is in no way justified . . . In the customary rhetoric of the demagogues these facts are represented quite differently. To listen to them, one would think that all progress in the techniques of production redounds to the exclusive benefit of a favored few, while the masses sink ever more deeply into misery. However, it requires only a moment’s reflection to realize that the fruits of all technological and industrial innovations make for an improvement in the satisfaction of the wants of the great masses.”

While Mises endeavors to explain liberalism rationally, he says that you can't explain anti-liberalism that way because they are not rational. He calls it Fourierism - a kind of neurosis that is basically envy.

Ch 1 The section on property reminded me a lot of what Rothbard wrote in New Liberty. Not surprising since I am sure Rothbard cited Mises a lot.

On Freedom: “Muddleheaded babblers may therefore argue interminably over whether all men are destined for freedom and are as yet ready for it. They may go on contending that there are races and peoples for whom Nature has prescribed a life of servitude and that the master races have the duty of keeping the rest of mankind in bondage. The liberal will not oppose their arguments in any way because his reasoning in favor of freedom for all, without distinction, is of an entirely different kind. We liberals do not assert that God or Nature meant all men to be free, because we are not instructed in the designs of God and of Nature, and we avoid, on principle, drawing God and Nature into a dispute over mundane questions. What we maintain is only that a system based on freedom for all workers warrants the greatest productivity of human labor and is therefore in the interest of all the inhabitants of the earth.”
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The section on Peace reminded me of . . .
​

I really liked section 2, talking about how by nature individuals will seek out beneficial relationships through mutual exchange. It's not that we believe that business is benevolent, but that like Adam Smith had said: it is not from their own generosity that the butcher and baker offer their service but of their own livelihood.

Former President Obama has repeatedly tried to infer cryptography is a threat to the /people/ if government doesn't have a skeleton key to everyone's digital house and digital papers by saying "Everyone is walking around with a swiss bank account in their pocket."

The first time I heard him say it out loud some years ago now, I thought to myself "that sounds expletive ideal!" .

The answer to the underlying and ongoing incessant plea by government to give them permission to do what they are already doing without permission, spying on the /people/, is of the form PRIVACY SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED.

Given that the governments have proven themselves without honor and have violated any trust or hope thereof to defend from plunder in the act of plundering themselves, privacy going forward will be kept by intellectual strength. This is not a request, this is an action a person takes, or doesn't take: responsibility for their own digital information security.

If you didn't read the chapter you probably won't get how that all relates together in terms of the shenanigans they've been up to since his observations were originally written. Trusting the other end to hold all the keys and the data has proven unwise, hasn't it?

Ch 1, pgs. 27-41I have some qualms about how Mises frames the discussion on equality. He finds fault with nineteenth century liberals (here I think we can substitute Thomas Jefferson though Mises noticeably does not call him out by name) because they argued for the equality of all men on the basis of natural rights theory. Mises argues that is preposterous because all you have to do is look at people to see they are not equal. But when Jefferson said all men are created equal he certainly did not mean that all men are identical.

Since he rejects equality as a reason for giving equal treatment under the law, he therefore resorts to making utilitarian arguments. He basically says that elites best not deprive the poor and working class of equal treatment because they are outnumbered and will meet resistance - usually bloody. However, you will recall that in New Liberty, Rothbard will argue that it is a mistake to make utilitarian arguments and that we must always argue from first principles.
In section five Mises argues that the luxuries of today inevitably become the necessities of tomorrow. I am glad to know that in the future we will all fly first class, have yachts, chauffeur driven limousines, and luxury boxes at the ballpark.

Section Six: “In requiring of the individual that he should take society into consideration in all his actions, that he should forgo an action that, while advantageous to him, would be detrimental to social life, society does not demand that he sacrifice himself to the interests of others. For the sacrifice that it imposes is only a provisional one: the renunciation of an immediate and relatively minor advantage in “exchange for a much greater ultimate benefit. The continued existence of society as the association of persons working in cooperation and sharing a common way of life is in the interest of every individual.”

In Section Seven, everyone should see the problem with this:
“There is, to be sure, a sect that believes that one could quite safely dispense with every form of compulsion and base society entirely on the voluntary observance of the moral code. The anarchists consider state, law, and government as superfluous institutions in a social order that would really serve the good of all, and not just the special interests of a privileged few. Only because the present social order is based on private ownership of the means of production is it necessary to resort to compulsion and coercion in its defense. If private property were abolished, then everyone, without exception, would spontaneously observe the rules demanded by social cooperation.”

Mises here to me seems to be arguing that anarchism is incompatible with private property. Of course, most of us now understand this to be incorrect and the present-day Mises Institute could be called the Anarcho-Capitalist Institute.

Mises writes: “Liberalism is not anarchism, nor has it anything whatsoever to do with anarchism.”

He may be right about that, which is why Rothbard used the term libertarianism to describe anarcho-capitalism and deliberately distinguished it from liberalism which he viewed as a sort of proto-libertarianism.
​
Mises goes on this same line to a sickening degree in Section Eight. When reading this I thought of this meme, but in place of "proud conservative" I guess you could photoshop Mises' face.

“The champions of democracy in the eighteenth century argued that only monarchs and their ministers are morally depraved, injudicious, and evil. The people, however, are altogether good, pure, and noble, and have, besides, the intellectual gifts needed in order always to know and to do what is right. This is, of course, all nonsense, no less so than the flattery of the courtiers who ascribed all good and noble qualities to their princes.”

That I agree with completely. However, he closes that same section:

“Only a group that can count on the consent of the governed can establish a lasting regime."
So he begins by criticizing democracy and closes by praising it. In between he seems to be making another utilitarian argument in favor of democracy.

Section 10 I like. Basically he argues that fascism at the time of his writing was popular because it was a response to the evils of Bolshevism.

“Many people approve of the methods of Fascism, even though its economic program is altogether antiliberal and its policy completely interventionist, because it is far from practicing the senseless and unrestrained destructionism that has stamped the Communists as the arch-enemies of civilization”

He was very prescient here:

“But when the fresh impression of the crimes of the Bolsheviks has paled, the socialist program will once again exercise its power of attraction on the masses.”

Section 11: Found this depressing considering it was written several decades ago:

“Other countries do not go so far, but nearly everywhere some restrictions are imposed on the sale of opium, cocaine, and similar narcotics."

Mises argues that once you concede government the power to prohibit certain substances you have lost the argument that they should not be able to prohibit certain reading material.

Section 12: He makes another utilitarian argument. The state should be tolerant of religious beliefs, not because every individual has freedom of conscience, but says Mises, because intolerance will lead to social unrest by persecuted religious.

We of course today would prefer no state around to be tolerant or intolerant of anything.
Section 13 Mises wrongly suggests that suppression of conduct detrimental to the social order requires a state. As we saw from Rothbard though that is not the case at all.

Ch 2, pgs. 60-84
In The Organization of the Economy, Mises points out the difference between redistributing capital among the working class and the communal ownership of property, but of course rejects both.

In "The Impracticality of Socialism" he says that while the common criticism that “most men will not exhibit the same zeal in the performance of the duties and tasks assigned to them that they bring to their daily work in a social order based on private property" is correct, it does not get at the heart of the matter: “What renders socialism impracticable is precisely the fact that calculation of this kind is impossible in a socialist society.”

In Sections 2 and 3 Mises says that since the world is not a paradise, people like to direct their unhappiness at the institution of private property and that governments by their very nature always attack private property. Below is a perfect example of that from a recent interview with New York City Mayor DeBlasio.
​
Mises says that while many people today understand that private property can not be dispensed with completely, they think government intervention is necessary to even the playing field. He explains though how every single government intervention in the voluntary exchange of goods and services can only make the market less efficient i.e. Back to Hazlitt's consequences seen and unseen.

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Ch 2, pgs. 85-94​

In section seven Mises argues that we have nothing to fear from natural monopolies. Reminded me of this Tom Woods episode

I would summarize section six as that capitalism is not perfect, just better than any other economic system conceivable. Reminded me of this:

Ch 3, pgs. 105-117Section 3.1 is brief, but I think complex.

Mises argued that for classical liberals, there is no divide between domestic and foreign policy: The same principles that apply to one apply to the other. And I would summarize that principle as non-interventionism: no intervention by government in the domestic economy and no intervention by government in the affairs of foreign governments - i.e. Peace, commerce and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none.

So far, so good, but

Mises goes on to extol the virtues of cosmopolitanism vis-a-vis nationalism. Also fine. But he then argued a that national unity is itself a product of liberalism. THAT seems to conflict a bit with the point he just made, and quite a bit with the book we read by Tom DiLorenzo where he made the case that DISUNITY within a nation is a force for good when it comes to libertarianism and advocated secession and nullification as tools to advance liberty.

Ch 3, pgs. 118-141Section 3.4 Mises argues that ethic conflicts within heterogeneous nations can only be avoided when said nation completely adopts a liberal program. As per Rothbard though:
​

Ch. 4, pgs. 155-169We often hear complaints that libertarianism does not advance due to some failure or another in tactics or strategy on the part of libertarians. In Section 4.1 Mises dismisses that concern saying that liars and tricksters need tactics and strategy but that if people can't see the truth for themselves there is no hope for them.

Mises goes even further:

“Most people do not have even the intellectual endowments required to think through the—after all very complicated—problems of social cooperation, and they certainly do not have the will power necessary to make those provisional sacrifices that all social action demands.”

Well that is certainly downer, leaving all political activity completely useless. (He makes that explicit in the next section). I am left wondering what is the point of his even writing and publishing books if he believes that?

Ch. 4, pgs. 170-187Section 4.3
"There are, therefore, only two parties: the party in power and the one that wants to be in power . . . As their demands are, in principle, limitless, it is impossible for any one of these parties ever to achieve all the ends it envisages . . . Every party seeks, nevertheless, to attain to such influence as will permit it to satisfy its desires as far as possible, while also taking care always to be able to justify to its electors why all their wishes could not be fulfilled."

Section 4.4.
"Society cannot, in the long run, exist if it is divided into sharply defined groups, each intent on wresting special privileges for its own members”

To me that is almost like saying "Society can not in the long run exist. Period." Mises I think unwittingly makes the case for radical individualism. Or It's saying politics will cause society to cease, if we keep it up.

Section 4.5 he returns to the idea that liberals must fight force with ideas not counter-force.
Section 4.6. He returns to the idea that critics of liberalism will claim that liberalism is the special interest of capitalists, but that that is false because capitalism ultimately benefits not just one class of people, but everyone. In a liberal system property rights belong to all, not just to capitalists.

Ch 5In Chapter Five, Mises argues that the enemies of capitalism have lost the debate that alternatives to capitalism can lead to greater material wealth, so they have moved the goalpost and now claim that material wealth is a societal ill. Mises replies though that a return to primitive asceticism would result in the deaths of billions of people.

"Liberalism is no world view because it does not try to explain the cosmos and because it says nothing and does not seek to say anything about the meaning and purpose of human existence . . . It seeks to give men only one thing, the peaceful, undisturbed development of material well-being for all."

SummaryAs I mentioned a few times in earlier chapters, my beef with Mises is that he is a minarchist. That is a step backward after having read Rothbard. Rothbard and Hoppe take the foundation established by Mises to its next logical progression. I know it is not really possible, but it would be great if we could read books in historical order of their logical progression toward anarchy-capitalism. If you want to read the precursors of Mises, the first appendix of this book is a good place to start.
​
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2 - Some Americans will be forced into involuntarily servitude at the point of the federal government’s gun.

This is really not complicated.

SCOTUS will, by judicial fiat, create a de facto new “amendment” to the Constitution, allowing offended persons to enslave those who offended them, or they will simply tell the offended persons to take their business elsewhere. (They could also tell them to bake their own damn cake.)

This is not about “equality” to the radical, activist elements of the LGBTQWKRPINCINCINNATI crowd. This is about retribution and backdoor reparations.

Yes — homosexuals have been unfairly and unjustly treated by elements of our society, and even by our laws, since before our country’s Founding — but asking for government to force another human into your service is not the moral path to equality.

Being offended is not justification for tying up either the courts or another citizen’s hands.

I fear this decision.

It basically comes down to Justice Kennedy.

One man . . . ONE FREAKIN’ MAN(!!!) has the power to either create a new classification of legalized slavery, or tell those offended that some animals ARE NOT more equal than others.

There needn’t be religious rights, gay rights, or free speech arguments presented in this case. It’s far more cut-n-dried than that:

If this were truly about equal rights, I’d be standing with the gay couple — but it’s not. This is about one group punishing another group for their multi-generational sins, and doing so at the expense of a single individual’s liberty.

Their intent is to force the baker into their service, against his will. If he refuses, they want him to pay a fine or lose his business. If he refuses to pay, they want him visited upon by armed agents of the government. If he resists, they want those agents to use force in order to bind and imprison him. If he refuses to be taken, they expect him to be shot.

What does the baker desire from the gay couple? Nothing other than to be left alone. Hell . . . he didn’t even want their money.

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Politics and thieves, coercion and regulation, fascism and the Fed, centralization and liberty, workers and unions, trade and freedom, free-market achievements and government disasters in American history — this book covers it all!

Section 1: Coercion and Regulation

I thought his synopsis and examples from Forty Centuries of Wage and Price Control: How NOT to Fight Inflation was solid. I’ll be adding it to my reading list. Unfortunately, no AudioBook version!

The “DiLorenzo’s Laws of Government” are pretty solid. I’ll need to expound on them later in a longer article and have them somewhere where I can share them easier when I’m arguing with people who want bigger government. They resounded with me as I think they will with others.

• DiLorenzo’s First Law of Government- In government, failure is success. Welfare Bureaucracy, Government Schools, NASA tragedies and the Federal Reserve, etc.

• DiLorenzo’s Second Law of Government- Politicians will rarely, if ever, assume responsibility for any of the problems that they cause with bad policies.

• DiLorenzo’s Third Law of Government- With few exceptions, politicians are habitual liars.

• DiLorenzo’s Fourth Law of Government- Politicians will only take the advice of their legions of academic advisers if the advice promises to increase the state’s power, wealth, and influence even if the politicians know that the advice is bad for the rest of society.

I also agreed that the price control section was timely after the debate we just endured following Hurricane Irma. I've written EXTENSIVELY about it here on my Steemit blog. How is it that The Continental Congress wisely adopted an anti-price control resolution on June 4, 1778 but it's still up for debate the negative effects?

That Resolution read:

“Whereas it hath been found by experience that limitations upon the prices of commodities are not only ineffectual for the purpose proposed, but likewise productive of very evil consequences—resolved, that it be recommended to the several states to repeal or suspend all laws limiting, regulating or restraining the price of any Article.”

If they knew price controls always failed 240 years ago, why is it even a question today? I blame education, or lack thereof.

Chapter 3 Who Will Regulate the Regulators
​
The logic on ‘providing more power to the Fed in order to prevent another Great Recession” was spot on:

“One of the biggest governmental lies is that financial markets are unregulated and in dire need of more central planning by government. Laissez-faire is said to have caused the “Great Recession.” Fed bureaucrats have lobbied for some kind of Super Regulatory Authority to supposedly remedy this problem. Th is is all a lie because according to one of the Fed’s own publications (“The Federal Reserve System: Purposes and Functions”), the Fed already has “supervisory and regulatory authority” over the following partial list of activities: bank holding companies, state-chartered banks, foreign branches of member banks, edge and agreement corporations, U.S. state-licensed bank branches, agencies and representative offices of foreign banks, nonbanking activities of foreign banks, national banks, savings banks, nonbank subsidiaries of bank holding companies, thrift holding companies, financial reporting procedures of banks, accounting policies of banks, business “continuity” in case of economic emergencies, consumer protection laws, securities dealings of banks, information technology used by banks, foreign investment by banks, foreign lending by banks, branch banking, bank mergers and acquisitions, who may own a bank, capital “adequacy standards,” extensions of credit for the purchase of securities, equal opportunity lending, mortgage disclosure information, reserve requirements, electronic funds transfers, interbank liabilities, Community Reinvestment Act sub-prime lending “demands,” all international banking operations, consumer leasing, privacy of consumer financial information, payments on demand deposits, “fair credit” reporting, transactions between member banks and their affiliates, truth in lending, and truth in savings.”​
​

Chapter 5: Our Totalitarian Regulatory Bureaucracy​
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“In chapter 5 of F.A. Hayek’s 1944 classic, Th e Road to Serfdom, the Nobel laureate warned that the state need not directly control all or even most of the means of production to exert totalitarian control over the economic life of a nation. He cited the example of Germany where, as of 1928, “the central and local authorities directly control 53 percent” of the German economy. In addition to this, wrote Hayek, private industry in Germany was so heavily regulated that the state indirectly controlled “almost the whole economic life of the nation.” It was through such totalitarian controls that Germany traveled down “the road to serfdom.” As Hayek further stated, “there is, then scarcely an individual end which is not dependent for its achievement on the action of the state, and the ‘social scale of values’ which guides the state’s action must embrace practically all individual ends.” In other words, government regulation was so pervasive that the pursuit of profit, driven by consumer preferences, was mostly replaced by the whims of regulatory bureaucrats.”

Well Said:

“First, construct a totally unrealistic theory of “perfect” competition that assumes away all real-world competition with assumptions of perfect information, homogenous products and prices, free or costless entry and exit from industry, and “many” firms. Second, compare real-world markets to this utopian Nirvana state and condemn the markets as “imperfect” or “failed. The third characteristic of market failure theories is to recommend intervention by presumably perfect government that is assumed to suffer from no failures and which will correct the failures of the market.”

When I read that, it reminded me of this.

Section 2

I read DiLorenzo's Real Lincoln which I highly recommend. I like how in chapter nine he describes Rod Blogajevich as an amateur crook compared to Honest Abe. It is not just a matter of businesses contributing to campaigns to get political favors but politicians using threat of regulations to extort contributions.

Chapter 11

Good point on the housing bubble:

“So when the Fed’s expansionary monetary policy caused the real estate bubble, the extraordinary increases in property values were accompanied by equally extraordinary property tax increases. (After the bubble had burst, local governments were eager to raise property tax rates so as not to lose property tax revenue."

Chapter 12

“A principle of public choice economics is that politicians will always do all they can to disguise subsidies to less-than-meritorious groups, such as millionaire corporate farmers. If they can subsidize them through protectionism, or price supports, this is much preferred than simply writing the millionaire businessman a check.”

Chapter 13

He discusses Hamilton and I recommend the Tom Woods vs Michael Malice debate (in which I side with Tom.

Chapter 15

He expands a bit on the idea he expressed earlier of why exactly mainstream media is so pro-government.

Section 3

I agree with DiLorenzo that secession, nullification, decentralization and localism is more effective at achieving liberty than nationalism or universalism, but it is important to understand, “Of course “states” don’t have rights; only individuals do." Since he understands that I think it is confusing that he keeps using the phrase.

I definitely agree with him that repeal of the seventeenth amendment would greatly improve our situation. But that that seems highly unlikely to ever happen.

Chapter 17

The Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions. I read this short book a few years ago and highly recommend it.

“The Lacrosse, Wisconsin Democrat newspaper advocate assassination when it editorialized in November of 1864 that “If Abraham Lincoln should be reelected for another term of four years of such wretched administration, we hope that a bold hand will be found to plunge the dagger into the tyrant’s heart for the public welfare.” (Does that violate the NAP?)

Chapter 22

DiLorenzo basically says that Abraham Lincoln and Adolph Hitler were brothers from another mother.

Chapter 23

He points out that governments are by far the worst killers in history and that in that regard Abraham Lincoln was worse than Pol Pot.

Chapter 25

DiLorenzo eviscerates Paul Krugman, which is always fun.

“Krugman is right about democracy in a sense: Democracy is essentially one big organized act of bullying whereby a larger group bullies a smaller group in order to plunder it with taxes. The “Civil War” proved that whenever a smaller group has finally had enough, and attempts to leave the game, the larger group will resort to anything—even the mass murder of hundreds of thousands and the bombing and burning of entire cities—to get its way.”

In these chapters he does still more debunking of the Lincoln mythology. I did notice though that he doesn't claim that the War of Northern Aggression was an unmitigated evil - just mostly evil with terrible consequences, but he does acknowledge that the abolition of slavery was the one positive outcome of the war.

He also discusses how American government is both fascist and socialist.

Chapter 30 – 33

These chapters are all about the evils of central banking.

I agree completely and have nothing to add except that coincidentally yesterday, before reading chapter 30, I used a very similar article by DiLorenzo to counter a commenter on this post who was saying that all economists think the Fed is great and that basically Ron is a crank.

That post and Brion's book should be of interest to anyone who liked that chapter.

Ch 32 reminded me of this meme.
​

Chapter 34

This chapter debunks the notion that the Federal Reserve is in any way libertarian just because Alan Greenspan was head of it once.

Chapter 35

Debunks the myth that the Fed is in any way independent - Fed chairmen basically do the bidding of the president in order to maintain their jobs. President wants loose policy? President gets loose policy, and vice versa.

I liked his discussion on the damage done by typical college economics textbooks, particularly Paul Samuelson's, which is most popular.

Chapter 36

Explains how government caused the sub-prime mortgage meltdown.
This is useful because people often try to blame DE-regulation when nothing could be further from the truth.

As an aside, I found The Big Short an entertaining movie on the subject if you have not seen it, but it largely leaves unmentioned government as a cause and this chapter definitely fills in the blanks.

Section 5Chapter 47

Macroeconomists Discover Economics and Debunk the New Deal (Again) is probably the most intriguing to me. Seven decades of economists who have sold us the line that the New Deal and large-scale government spending is what got us out of the Great Depression.
It took several decades but macroeconomic model builders, who consider themselves to be the elite of the economics profession, have finally discovered freshman-level principles of economics and have used that discovery to finally debunk FDR’s New Deal. (Beginning in the 1930s Austrian School economists like Henry Hazlitt recognized the truth about the New Deal: It made the Great Depression deeper and longer lasting.)

The only wise thing to have done was to have allowed the liquidation of hundreds of overcapitalized businesses to occur, cut taxes and spending, and deregulate. Instead, the Fed increased the money supply by 100 percent in a failed attempt to create another bubble while the president and Congress implemented an explosion of government interventionism. That was the

first time in American history that a depression was responded to with government interventionism rather than governmental retrenchment, and the result was a seventeen-year long Great Depression, the worst in history.

That mainstream macroeconomists and their modeling have come around against governmental interventionism during a depression is great. Now, if the citizenry can learn that before the next bubble pops. I foresee politicians and special interests will use the next crisis as an opportunity to line their pockets.

CHAPTER 48

Will Socialism Make You Happier? The Trojan Horse of “Happiness Research”I hadn't heard of this statist argument before but basically
​
"...statists around the world are changing their tune and saying that prosperity doesn’t really matter after all; what matters is how happy we are. And, they say, that is what government can be really, really good at—making us happy. Consequently, they argue, there should be no more limits on governmental powers, for limiting governmental powers will limit our very happiness."

In the year this book was published, Bhutan was the 'Happiest' according to the UN-sponsored "World Happiness Report". Yes, Bhutan. This hellhole, ahem, I mean paradise:

As an intelligence officer which has experience in this part of the world... No.

This year's winner is Norway, which is much more beautiful and bearable.Source:WORLD HAPPINESS REPORT 2017 It's also a lot more socialist, which to be fair, is the point. It's edited by leftist academic Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University, what else would you expect?

As F.A. Hayek commented in The Road to Serfdom, the end of socialism was always egalitarianism; only the means changed over time, beginning with government ownership of the means of production and transforming to income redistribution through a welfare state and a “progressive” income tax.

These happiness researchers never make any mention at all of the well documented pathologies created by welfare statism, such as the destruction of the work ethic, family breakup, the growth of dysfunctionality caused by a welfare state that removes people from the working population, etc.

Thus, “happiness research” is part of a crusade to persuade the public that poverty and servitude to the state are superior to prosperity and freedom. It is a new version of what twentieth-century communists referred to as “socialism with a smiling face” during the last, dying days of totalitarian communism.

Chapter 49

The Canard of “Asymmetric Information” as a Source of Market FailureGood information on the Nirvana Theory of Markets. I tried to look more into it, but it is unique to only this writing.

Nirvana Fallacy— comparing real-world markets to an unattainable utopian ideal (perfect competition), and then denouncing markets because they fall short of utopia or Nirvana. Having “proven” that markets “fail,” the analyst then proposes government intervention under the assumption that no such failures will infect government. Markets may not be perfect, but government is assumed to be.

Overall, I liked Section 5 the best. The ease at which he demystifies economic myths is extremely understandable. I just wish it was taken onboard by many voters who refuse to heed the empirical evidence against government intervention.

Asymmetric information problem really applies to government not the free market:

“In this case we are dealing with the well-established fact that, in their capacity as voters, people tend to be “rationally ignorant” of almost all of what government does. In fact, government is so pervasive that no human mind could possibly comprehend the tiniest fraction of one percent of what government in a country the size of the U.S. does. Consequently, special-interest groups dominate all democratic governments;”

A related problem I think is that "public servants" are allowed to keep secrets from their supposed masters.

Chapter 51

“Politicians perpetuate the myth of government job creation because the government jobs that are created are seen by the average voter, whereas the private-sector jobs that are destroyed (or never created) are not.”

DiLorenzo shoots down the gender wage gap myth. Tom Woods has done a couple of shows on this subject as well, as I recall.
​

Summary

DiLorenzo lays out a decent criticism of how Government, corrupted by size and motive, has engaged in forceful and deceitful acts against the populace.
​
To be honest, I really dislike collections of articles such as this and found in other "books". If an author is still alive, such collections are always better to be formed in to a true book that is able to cleanly explain a subject from start to finish. While DiLorenzo's articles are well written (and are quite often sourced with citations! Such a rarity among articles), the execution of the message would have been much better had he taken the time to write these out in to full chapters of their own.

The topics covered in the book were good ones to discuss (though I think that the mentions of the Civil war would be better served in a separate book), but I do wish that the author had expanded more on the topics of taxation, subsidies, and the enforcement of victimless crimes.
Overall a good read, and some articles were absolutely fantastic. If only the author could have written this out as an actual book and added another hundred pages or so, this could have been something especially fantastic.

edit: I've decided to give the book 5 stars, from the original 4. I find that I often go back to the book to re-read certain articles when I come across various topics of discussion. I still wish that the author had written a proper book instead of just compiling a collection of his articles, though.

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Clarence Seward Darrow (1857 – 1938) was an American lawyer and leading member of the American Civil Liberties Union. He wrote books on crime and punishment, as well as on the morality and origins of the system which are classics of the libertarian movement, and a cry for attention about all that is wrong in the legal system. Resist no Evil can be FOUND HERE and HERE.

Foreword by Douglas FrenchI love the fact that Douglas French starts with a truth I've recognized for a long time. I think it foreshadows how the book won't necessarily conform to common allowable opinion.

We’re drawn to books that reinforce what we already believe. It makes us feel smarter that an author shares our opinion and provides words we can use to make our case on the off chance that’s required.

Specifically he discusses the party politics that are prevalent in the world today.

At the time I remember being on the fence, with a slight lean toward supporting capital punishment. The deterrence arguments resonated with me. ... In the end, to not support capital punishment put a person with the bleeding heart liberals, company I didn’t want to be in. But this is the way with so many issues. Instead of analyzing the problem for ourselves, we let the group we identify with make the decision for us as to what we believe. A lazy way to live, requiring no thought, no study, no consideration, no introspection. Clarence Darrow does not allow for that. He does not allow you to sit in the jury box of public opinion and let the other jurors make up your mind.

Although written in 1902, Darrow anticipates the prison nation that America is today. The state is set up not to administer justice, but to punish. No victims are compensated, but the state gets its pound of flesh.

This reminded me of a Jason Stapleton Program show I was listening to recently. It discussed a Virginia man who was convicted of multiple counts of Grand Larceny (Theft greater than $200). The guy was stealing wheels off of cars and got sentenced to 132 years in prison. Jason Stapleton discussed why our system is apt to just throw people into prison and not have them work to repay the victims. Instead the victims got their tires stolen and THEN had to get taxed to support the criminal in prison for the rest of his life! Why not make the guy work with proceeds in reparations to the victims?

Darrow's Introduction sums up well what we all know if wrong with our criminal justice system.

CHAPTER I: THE NATURE OF THE STATE"The doctrine of non-resistance" that Darrow refers is generally defined as "the practice or principle of not resisting authority, even when it is unjustly exercised". So if it's the law, you follow it, regardless of morality. Looking historically, Slavery in the 1800s and locking Japanese Americans up during WWII come to mind. Looking at the present times, the examples of throwing people in jail for collecting rain water comes to mind. These Facebook stories usually have an abundance of "Well, don't break the law and you won't go to jail" comments.

To wit:

"Instead of saying 'Fuck the police', why don't you quit being so Japanese!"

Darrow suggests that, philosophically, it is man's highest ideal to live a fulfilled life in peace, not coerced by government force.

Endless volumes have been written, and countless lives been sacrificed in an effort to prove that one form of government is better than another; but few seem seriously to have considered the proposition that all government rests on violence and force, is sustained by soldiers, policemen and courts, and is contrary to the ideal peace and order which make for the happiness and progress of the human race.

Great analogy comparing the rulers of ancient times- Basically the biggest man got a large club and enforced his rule as chieftain through force over his tribe. He used his power primarily to maintain power not for the betterment of those he ruled over. As one man cannot maintain power for long, he cronied his buddies as lieutenants to maintain power "and they were given a goodly portion of the fruits of power for the loyalty and help they lent their chief." The parallels to today are evident.

From the early kings who, with blood-red hands, forbade their subjects to kill their fellow men, to the modern legislator, who, with the bribe money in his pocket, still makes bribery a crime, these rulers have ever made laws not to govern themselves but to enforce obedience on their serfs.

CHAPTER 2: ARMIES AND NAVIESHow is the authority of the state maintained? Darrow believes it to be maintained by force or the general threat of force. More generally, the power of armed men with all the 'modern implements of death". Specifically, 1) military personnel and 2) courts of justice, police and jails.

I don't believe Darrow is being realistic (in his time, or ours) that all countries should not have a standing armies. Sure, idealistically, if there were no wars, these men and women could lead more productive lives and build skills and participate in tradecraft, but ever since Napoleonic times, we are required to have a standing army as long as our neighbor does. I don't see the world's militaries self-disintegrating any time soon.

I also found his 'endless wars' rhetoric to be quite interesting considering he wrote it Pre World War I, World War II, Korean War, Sino-Russo War, Vietnam War, Lebanon, Granada, Tanker War, Persian Gulf War, Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, War on Terrorism, etc. The world hadn't seen nothin' yet!

The nation that would today disarm its soldiers and turn its people to the paths of peace would accomplish more to its building up than by all the war taxes wrung from its hostile and unwilling serfs.

Overall, I agree with the travesties of war, but don't agree with it's pragmatic to think everyone will demilitarize.

CHAPTER 3: THE PURPOSE OF ARMIESBut in reality the prime reason for all the armies of the world is that soldiers and militia may turn their guns upon their unfortunate countrymen when the owners of the earth shall speak the word.That this is the real purpose of standing armies and warlike equipment is plain to all who have eyes to see.

We can see how military equipment has been appropriated to our police forces (Thanks War on Drugs!) but I think the premise Darrow is extolling is something different. But thinking one caused the other is a fallacy of 'Post hoc ergo propter hoc'. Because the rooster crows as dawn, and then the sun rises at dawn, does not mean the rooster causes the sun to rise.

That the military is to be called on to directly suppress the free people isn't something that we've seen consistently. I mean, the National Guard is called sometimes for riot control, but Darrow's fears haven't been consistently witnessed throughout the passing of time.

CHAPTER 4: CIVIL GOVERNMENTAs society reaches the industrial stage, it is easier and costs less waste of energy for the ruling class to maintain its supremacy through the intricate forms and mazes of civil government, than through the direct means of soldiers and guns. Civil governments, like military governments, are instituted and controlled by the ruling class. Their purpose is to keep the earth and its resources in the hands of those who directly and indirectly have taken it for themselves.

Darrow begins to build the case of morality here. Just because the courts are decreeing something, it must be obeyed at the threat of impounding property, kidnapping and imprisonment of men or, in some cases, killing the offender.

... the will of the sovereign is law, and the law is made for the benefit of the ruler, not the ruled.

Darrow says that even a newly established government receives the historical laws and decrees 'based upon the old notions of properties and rights that were made to serve the rulers' previous. But I find that lazy (mostly because I'm a pro-property rights). Sometimes those are inherited because they are superior based on merit.

I love his description of Lobbyists.

The man who possesses one sort of power, as, for instance, political privilege, is very friendly to the class who possess another sort, as, for instance, wealth, and this community of interest naturally and invariably arrays all the privileged classes against the weak.

I wish that Darrow, instead of just criticizing the natural tendency for some men to desire to rule over others, he could provide some solutions other than 'We should just all live without government and its evils!'.

Order is more important than liberty, and at all costs order must be enforced upon the many.

Chapter 5

"All punishment and violence is largely mixed with the feeling of revenge, - from the brutal father who strikes his helpless child, to the hangman who obeys the orders of the judge; with every man who lays violent unkind hands upon his fellow the prime feeling is that of hatred and revenge"

^^ and this is what I have against retributive justice.

"In some inconceivable manner it is believed that when this punishment follows, justice has been done. But by no method of reasoning can it be shown that the injustice of killing one man is retrieved by the execution of another, or that the forcible taking of property is made right by confining some human being in a pen"

"To punish a human being simply because he has committed a wrongful act, without any thought of good to follow, is vengeance pure and simple, and more detestable and harmful than any casual isolated crime".

“Such acts as these would almost never be repeated. Genuine repentance follows most really vicious acts, but repentance, however genuine, gives no waiver of punishment.”

Do you all feel that it is entirely the act of imprisonment itself and nothing in any violent criminal, whether by nature or nurture, that leads to recidivism?

I don't know how it was in 1903, but I recently watched a few minutes of OJ Simpson's bail hearing. His repentance definitely did not waive his sentence, but i think it had a lot to do with his early release.

“The safety aimed at through punishment is not meant the safety for the individual, but it is contended that the fact that one person is punished for an act deters others from the commission of similar unlawful acts; it is obvious that there is a large class who are not deterred by these examples, for the inmates of prisons never grow less . . . "

I am not for locking in people in cages (nor for the death penalty) but I never thought of imprisonment as a deterrent. If there were any point to it at all, I think it would be to prevent that particular individual from being able to violate others' rights (except perhaps other inmates). If so, then imprisonment is not motivated solely by cruelty and hate as Darrow claims.

I did not realize his claim that public executions actually caused people to commit copycat crimes. I believe it but I wish he had actually documented this claim instead of just positing it.

Chapter 6

"The last refuge of the apologist is that punishment is inflicted to prevent crime"

"The theory that punishment is a preventive to unlawful acts does not seriously mean that it is administered to prevent the individual from committing a second or a third unlawful act."

He goes one to talk about how if the punishment is to be a deterrent, then we should logically use only the cruelest methods of punishment, but we don't, so therefore how can we claim that the punishment is a deterrent?

His point at the end of chapter VI that the state is constantly trying to "improve" prisons brings to my mind the prohibition in the Bill of Rights against cruel and unusual punishment. I find that a pretty problematic phrase, for who is to say that imprisonment itself is not cruel? I guess the fact that it is so common makes it not unusual.

Chapter 7

Darrow discusses, as the chapter title states, the cause of crime, and says that we should ponder on that. I have long felt that this is an important thing to consider, and this is why I am so interested in restorative justice. I feel that we should seek out WHY this crime happened and work to fix that through psychological means if possible.

I think he is making the case for nurture as the cause of criminal behavior rather than nature. As such he points to the fact that inmates tend to be poorer than non-inmates. However he throws "mentally deficient" in there as well which is more nature than nurture. He seems to be making a class warfare argument, but I think he overlooks the possibility that more poor convicts than wealthy convicts does not necessarily mean there are more poor criminals that wealthy. That could be a result of disparities in the criminal justice system itself that allow more wealthy people to get away with the crimes they commit.

What do you think of his closing in that chapter? To wit:

"The jail and the penitentiary are not the first institutions planted by colonists in a new country, or by pioneers in a new state. These pioneers go to work to till the soil, to cut down the forests, to dig the ore; it is only when the owning class has been established and the exploiting class grows up, that the jail and the penitentiary become fixed institutions, to be used for holding people in their place.”

**Another class warfare argument**. But you could just as easily flip that. Perhaps it is not until the owning class is sufficiently established in a new settlement that there is enough stuff making it worth the while of the working class to try and steal, thus motivating the owning class to get around to building jails.

Chapter 8

"Reason and Judgement as well as an almost endless array of facts have proven that crime is not without its cause. In showing its cause, its cure has been made plain. If the minds and energies of men were directed toward curing crime instead of brutally assaulting the victims of society, some progress might be made"

"Nearly every crime would be wiped away in one generation by giving the criminal a chance. The life of a burglar, of a thief, of a prostitute, is not a bed of roses. Men and women are only driven to these lives after other means have failed."

Chapters 9-12
For a trial lawyer, Darrow sure has plenty of criticism for trial by jury. I am looking forward to the part where we get to his alternative.

"He cannot understand how a so-called thief should have forcibly taken a paltry sum. He cannot conceive that he, himself, could under any circumstances have done the like.”

Not sure if that is universally true. Don't judges frequently consider mitigating circumstances in sentencing? In the film "Inherit The Wind" the jury found Cates guilty, but the judge fined him only one hundred dollars causing Brady to drop dead.Chapter 13-15
I think in the Afterword Riggenbach gives Darrow entirely too much credit when he writes:

“This illustrates the extent to which the Clarence Darrow of 1902 was on pretty much the same wavelength as the Murray Rothbard of 80 years later.”

On the contrary, I submit that Darrow was the anti-Rothbard and that Riggenbach credits Darrow for things Rothbard wrote but that Darrow did not.

Here he comes blatant what was hinted at in the previous chapters-

“Most of the laws governing the taking and obtaining of property, which constitute the great burden of our penal code, are arbitrary acts, whose sole purpose is to keep the great mass of property in the hands of the rulers and exploiters and to send to jail those who help themselves and who have no other means within their power."

What he is advocating here is closer to anarcho-communism than anarcho-capitalism and would prevent me from ever recommending this book, despite some of the good points he makes about the state and criminal justice earlier.

“These crimes are burglary, larceny, obtaining property by false pretenses, extortion, and the like. The jails and penitentiaries of every nation in the world are filled to overflowing with men and women who have been charged with committing crimes against property.”

I don't know about 1903, but I would have no complaint if that were actually true today. But actually they are filled with victims of the drug war and people who have committed only various "crimes" against the state.

The way he concludes chapter 13 and chapters 14 and 15 are completely at odds with Rothbard's analysis of property rights in *New Liberty*.

Chapter 16 was a big letdown
Here Darrow claims to offer his alternative to what he spent the last dozen chapters insisting does not work. His alternative amounts to ending punishment and adopting kindness instead. But he offers no concrete examples of how that operate in practice.

Say you are a parent and someone pre meditatively rapes and murders your children. What would Darrow say should be done with the offender. Certainly not put them on trial because no one is qualified to sit in judgement nor understand the perpetrator's woes. Apparently the victims' parents are just supposed to show the perpetrator love and kindness.

Riggenbach:

“I won’t leave you with the impression that Clarence Darrow was an early, unsung Rothbardian, because he wasn’t.”

**Talk about an understatement!**

Summary
There are some quotes in the book I like, especially in the first four chapters when he is trashing the state. But I have previously outlined my criticisms:

1. It is more a polemic than expository. He posits a lot of things without making an argument for them, citing examples to prove his case etc.

2. He spends chapters critiquing the criminal justice system, generating anticipation for his alternative, yet when he gets to that point, there really is not much substance at all. He COULD have advocated restorative justice, sure, but he really did not.

3. In the final two chapters he advocates class warfare - the forced redistribution of the property of the wealthy.

Initially I had hoped that this might at least be a book I could recommend to the left to help shake their confidence in the state, but ultimately it is not a book I would comfortable recommending to anyone.

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Please don't do fireworks in your neighborhood
Please be considerate of your neighbors who may need to go into work early, and of course all the pets who are extremely frightened of them! I have neighbors who do this every year out in the street in front of their house, also letting their children set them off.

The quote above was actually posted in many forms by my neighbors using the NextDoor App.

Wait, so let me get this straight, my kid can't play with sparklers or a few crackling 'tanks' because you have to get up early?

We've come a long way from 'Land of the Free'.

These fines from the City of Fort Worth aren't 'for our safety' or because the government 'cares about your terrier who doesn't like the noise'. They are there because the government wants every chance possible to take money from you.

With so many laws on the books, there's ALWAYS something you are doing wrong that they can come fine/arrest you for. Will they? Not necessarily, but you become a nuisance to them, they've got plenty of things they COULD harass you for.

No thanks. I moved to Texas to get away from California-style encroachment into my personal business. Also, my kid loves sparklers. Throw your dog in the bathroom with a TV/Radio on, like I do mine. He loves the extra treats he gets NYE and July 4th.

Loo, I am all about honoring my neighbors. But there's also personal responsibility. I'm not trying to shoot bottle rockets over my neighbor's house. Got it, that could lead to fire. A fire, I'd rather not be financially liable for.

I'm talking about the neighbor who calls the cops on me because I'm sitting in the driveway with my 2 and 4 year old playing with sparklers and throwing snap-crackles at our feet. A neighbor that obviously doesn't understand "Letter of the Law vs Spirit of the Law" common sense.

How about we let adults act like adults. If adults shoot a firework and start a fire, let them be liable and accountable for their actions.

Adults used to be responsible, now we just use government force to prevent people from doing what they want.

I bet you're pretty angry when people infringe on your liberty by using policemen with guns to prevent you from doing something you're extremely capable of doing just because some others don't mind and aren't bothered by the restriction.

Worried about the dangers of fireworks? Don't use them. But don't tell others what to do and cheer when laws are passed.

Also, fireworks these days are cheap, Chinese variants, not dangerous $1,000 explosions like you see on TV."

"Get the equivalent of a Ph.D. in libertarian thought and free-market economics online for just 24 cents a day." Most of us learned politically correct U.S. history in school. The economics was at least as bad.
It's never too late to learn the truth.
At Liberty Classroom, you can learn real U.S. history, Western civilization, and free-market economics from professors you can trust.
Short on time? No problem. You can learn in your car.
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We are a monthly book club for anyone who wants to learn more about Libertarianism. We will discuss each book's chapter/section in separate posts, so everyone will be able to read along at their own pace. We typically also focus on books which are available for free so that everyone can participate.

Chapter 1

I highlighted a good deal in this chapter and I'm sure everyone will excuse me for the heavy quote pasting.

"Free people are not subservient, but neither are they uncontrolled. They control themselves. Taking control of your life is an act of both freedom and responsibility"

"Unsurprisingly, they consider freedom frightening. As a consequence, many have believed that order and virtue must be imposed at the expense of freedom. They equate responsibility with submission to the commands of others."

"One can never legislate or choose the outcomes directly; all legislators or rulers can do is to change the incentives that participants in social interactions face. Thus, actions may be outlawed because the legislators think they're bad"

I think this chapter does a nice job of explaining a few things:

1) My life is mine. Not anyone else's. I really enjoy endurance sports (MMA, bike touring, hiking marathons, and most recently the dreaded Barkley Marathon ("the race that eats its young"). I can not rely on government to keep me safe; it is my responsibility - and mine alone - to keep myself safe. If I'm stupid, then I reap the consequences for that, if I am smart; the benefits.

2) No victim, no crime. I hate drugs. Hate them. I don't want to be around them. I don't want to watch others do them. With that said, it is immoral for me to push this belief on to others, we must look at the proof that the law hasn't prevented drug usage (arguably, it's only gotten worse and created a violent black market around it).

There are a few other highlights I liked quite a bit:

"Self-control is never perfect, but state control is no improvement"

"A harmonious society rests on respect for the freedom of each member"

"The rules of the road facilitate the transportation of millions of people to millions of different destinations, all without a central power issuing commands to them; they're not perfect, but rather simple rules of the road help many millions of people to avoid collisions and arrive where they want to be every minute of every day"

'But without police at every street corner, why would anyone follow the law?', the statist asks.

Simple: it's in everyone's best interest to follow the rues of the road.

Chapter 2

Clearly, the nanny state and the desire to protect us all from ourselves is counter-productive. It seems that society can - and would - flourish much more in a society that allowed individuals to make their own choices.

"The Founding Fathers believed in the unalienable human right to liberty, but they knew it depended on personal responsibility. To be freed from a tyrant's rule, men had to be able to rule themselves: that truth seemed self-evident"

"In workplaces, managers scoring high in self-control were rated more favorably by their subordinates as well as by their peers. People with good self-control seemed exceptionally good at forming and maintaining secure, satisfying attachments to other people. They were shown to be better at emphasizing with others and considering thing from other people's perspectives"

"When she tested prisoners and then tracked them for years after their release, she found that the ones with low self-control were most likely to commit more crimes and return to prison"

Chapter 3

As will be covered more in future chapters, the welfare state brings a host of problems: namely that it keeps the poor, poor.

I really don't like anti-welfare arguments centered around the belief of "they're just lazy" (this is as old as at least the Victorian period. Check out the TV mini-series "Victorian Slum House") as there is a lot more to it than that and the negatives of the welfare state expand much more than just that "some people are too lazy to work."

"We are throwing these people a life preserver to keep them afloat, but not pulling them into the boat. They are effectively creating and perpetuating a dependent class".

"One of the first things our welfare system does is make people poorer so that they may qualify for benefits. Qualifying for benefits means spending down assets and savings, and that includes vehicles, which is especially problematic".

Chapter 5

This chapter breaks down how only Property Rights can prevent overfishing. "Fisheries using Individual Fishing Quotas (IFQs) in places ranging from Iceland to New Zealand have seen fish populations stabilize and even grow along with fishing incomes". But... but .... without fishing licenses controlled by the government, that's impossible!

Additionally, this chapter elaborates on some things Murray Rothbard wrote in New Liberty.

"Environmental problems are generally conflicting claims over resources and how they are used. Property rights help to resolve those conflicts by providing a legal institution that prioritizes particular uses—the uses that the owner prioritizes, in the time frame that the owner chooses. For some environmental problems, such as chemical pollution in a self-contained lake, individual ownership of the land that includes the lake is likely to give the owner incentives to maintain the lake’s quality, either for his/her own consumption value or because pollution would reduce the market value of the property."

Chapter 7

My favorite chapter thus far! Contrary to a point I made about an earlier chapter, this one does seem to advocate for a stateless society, or at least nearly so:

"It is often assumed that the Catholic Church, because of its social teaching, is committed to high levels of state intervention and regulation. However, in its most authoritative document on such matters, it states:

"Another task of the state is that of overseeing and directing the exercise of human rights in the economic sector. However, primary responsibility in this area belongs not to the state but to individuals and to the various groups and associations which make up society.”"

One wonders why in this quote "sole" could not replace "primary?"

"The reaction to the financial crash of 2007–2008 provides an indication of how state regulatory institutions are created and operate. In the wake of the crash, tens of thousands of pages of regulations were written and promulgated. It was estimated that the Dodd–Frank Act in the United States, with its associated regulations, would come to thirty thousand pages.

In 2011, some 14,200 new financial regulations were created worldwide. That trend was underway well before the financial crash. It is often asserted that there was a period of deregulation before the financial crash and that the crash was a consequence of deregulation. That is not so, certainly not in the United Kingdom."

The evidence is quite strong that systems of state regulation have not been successful. Not only did the comprehensive systems of financial regulation that developed in the United Kingdom from 1986 and in the United States from the 1930s not prevent the financial crash, but in many ways they were contributory causes that exacerbated and spread the crisis globally. Many forms of mistaken and reckless behavior that led to the failures of banks and other financial institutions in 2007–2008 were encouraged by regulation."

Boy, you can say that again.

The dominant historical narrative suggests that, before the twentieth century, urban development was chaotic and that each property owner and developer could do what they wished without regard to the impact of their actions on anyone else. The result, supposedly, was terrible slums, and ugly unplanned development. (A visit to such places as Bath and Bloomsbury might raise doubts about that narrative, of course.)"

I was in Bath about a year and a half ago and can confirm.

I also love the point made on pages 89-90 how urban sprawl was caused by "muh roads" being taken over by government from private turnpike trusts.

"Interestingly, the same people who advance that account also often complain about “suburban sprawl” in the United States without stopping to reflect that such “sprawl” is associated with and largely caused by governmental regulatory regimes. Complaints about the ugliness and poor quality of public and private buildings produced under the pre-1948 regime in Britain are also puzzling when one considers the poor quality of so many buildings that have been produced since that time."

Chapter 10

"A free person makes her own choices and manages her own life; an unfree person's life is managed by someone else"

"We are free persons, rather than mere material objects, because we can be held accountable for our acts. We are distinguished as individuals by what we do - the very things for which we are responsible. Responsibility for our actions and the freedom to choose for ourselves foster social cooperation, coordination, and harmony, and when our freedom and responsibility are overridden, social order is disrupted and conflict replaces harmony."

"...welfare states tax to provide (frequently monopolistically) through political means what could be provided and chosen voluntarily - from retirement income, to medical care, to housing, to education - and in the process induce people to reduce their savings, engage in riskier behavior, abandon voluntary mutual aid organizations, and pay less attention to securing their own well-being and that of their families and communities."

"Replacing self-control with state control rarely generates any of the benefits claimed by its enthusiasts and always generates other, unintended, consequences."

Overall

Self Control or State Control introduces the reader to a number of different concepts that they may not be aware of in which the State controls us and the life we wish to live for ourselves. Most of the 11 chapters are written by a different authors, but they all compliment one another well.

This book covers a range of topics, such as the welfare state (how and why it has failed), business regulations, will power, the philosophy of individualism, and others. Overall, I found the book to be an interesting read, and I really liked that each chapter contained numerous references (I'm quite the stickler for this. Without references, a book such as this isn't worth much).

I think that this is a fantastic read for those that are new to Libertarianism, and I believe that it is especially good for those that are crossing over from a previously Left-wing ideology.

4½ stars overall, since I found some parts of the chapters discussing individualism to be somewhat dry. Still a great book and a suggested read!

MORE FROM LIBERTYLOL:

"Single acts of tyranny may be ascribed to the accidental opinion of the day, but a series of oppressions, begun at a distinguished period, and pursued unalterably through every change of (politicians), too plainly prove a deliberate and systematic plan of reducing us all to slavery." -Thomas Jefferson

The problem with the news today is they no longer provide an objective look at what happened. Instead, they provide a biased point of view and then tell you what to think and how to feel about it.

Instead, I'll cover two competing views on Republican Representative Justin Amash's YES vote on the American Health Care Act (AHCA) and allow you to make up your own mind. Haven't read it yet? I'll post it at the bottom of the article in an effort to declutter.

We'll first look at his decision and validate it against our Principle of "Constitutionalism". This allows us to determine whether the new AHCA bill is even valid, legal or constitutional.

The second way to critique Representative Amash's decision and look at his reasoning. We can then determine if the new AHCA incrementally takes us 'Closer to Liberty' or 'Closer to Tyranny'.

Is AHCA even Constitutional?

There is no gray area on this question. The AHCA Bill is either constitutional or it's not. If it's not, Rep Amash took an oath to uphold the constitution and failed by voting YES. A NO vote on an unconstitutional bill is a constitutional vote. A YES vote for an unconstitutional bill is an unconstitutional vote.

The argument from those who uphold this principle of Constitutionality will claim that we even if AHCA is incrementally better than ObamaCare, his vote on a law that violates the Constitution should be an automatic NO.

They would also claim that just because this unconstitutional law is slightly better than the previous unconstitutional law, Libertarians have never been about voting for the lesser of two evils, Quite the opposite.
So is AHCA unconstitutional? Again, I won't tell you what to think but reading more on it should color your favorability (or not) or Rep Amash's vote. No one has ever been able to clearly articulate to me why the Robert's precedent made ObamaCare constitutional so I'm not the guy to give legal advice. Might I suggest a couple great articles:

Does AHCA Take us Closer to Liberty or Closer to Tyranny?

Those who support Rep Amash's YES vote because "AHCA is incrementally better than ObamaCare" will typically claim that they are 'realists' in the room. They understand that we won't wake up tomorrow living in a libertarian society with a perfectly Free Market Health Care system. They argue that libertarians have to do what we can, when we can, to reduce the size of government, even if incrementally.

Rep Amash knows that a NO vote doesn't repeal ObamaCare, it's the law of the land. Realistically, he notes, a YES vote can at least get us started in a new direction, one towards Liberty.

This might be true even though I believe AHCA to be a monstrosity of legal code atop another monstrosity of legal code.

The problem is that for for the past seven years, Republicans have run for Congress on a commitment to repeal Obamacare. And now, even though they claim this is it, they are only amending ObamaCare, retooling the subsidies, taking out the individual mandate, and ensuring the government is the one who maintains power of the health care market.

The AHCA is bad politics for the Republicans and bad policy for Amash's name to be tied to. Why risk putting your name on a slightly better turd sandwich than the one you inherited? The one they all got elected on promising to repeal? The one they passed very clear Repeal Legislation on more than 50 times when they knew President Obama would just veto?

It seems to me that allowing the ill-effects of government intervention into the health care market only empowers those calling for Single Payer, a death knell for individual liberty and one that ensures increased scope of government and decreased quality of product.

My principles of Limited Government and Free Markets refuses to support AHCA. Part of me cheers knowing that it's not likely to pass the Senate in it's current form.

Conclusion

This is a tough one. I'd love to hear your thoughts below on whether your support the AHCA because 'at least it's a slightly better turd sandwich' or if you'd prefer a NO vote on it because 'Repeal ObamaCare or NOTHING'.

Would you be happy living with ObamaCare for another few years in an attempt to try to get full repeal? I'm not optimistic that any power given to the government is one that you'll see them give back without a long fight and without multiple electoral consequences for politicians.

This is not the bill we promised the American people. For the past seven years, Republicans have run for Congress on a commitment to repeal Obamacare. But it is increasingly clear that a bill to repeal Obamacare will not come to the floor in this Congress or in the foreseeable future.When Republican leaders first unveiled the American Health Care Act, a Democratic friend and colleague joked to me that the bill wasn’t a new health care proposal; it was plagiarism. He was right.The AHCA repeals fewer than 10 percent of the provisions in the Affordable Care Act. It is an amendment to the ACA that deliberately maintains Obamacare’s framework. It reformulates but keeps tax credits to subsidize premiums. Instead of an individual mandate to purchase insurance, it mandates a premium surcharge of 30 percent for one year following a lapse of coverage. And the bill continues to preserve coverage for dependents up to age 26 and people with pre-existing conditions.I want to emphasize that last point. The bill does not change the ACA’s federal requirements on guaranteed issue (prohibition on policy denial), essential health benefits (minimum coverage), or community rating (prohibition on pricing based on health status). In short, Obamacare’s pre-existing conditions provisions are retained.The latest version of the AHCA does allow any state to seek a waiver from certain insurance mandates, but such waivers are limited in scope. Guaranteed issue cannot be waived. Nobody can be treated differently based on gender. And any person who has continuous coverage—no lapse for more than 62 days—cannot be charged more regardless of health status.Consider what this means: Even in a state that waives as much as possible, a person with a pre-existing condition cannot be prevented from purchasing insurance at the same rate as a healthy person. The only requirement is that the person with the pre-existing condition get coverage—any insurer, any plan—within 62 days of losing any prior coverage.If a person chooses not to get coverage within 62 days, then that person can be charged more (or less) based on health status for up to one year, but only (1) in lieu of the 30 percent penalty (see above), (2) if the person lives in a state that has established a program to assist individuals with pre-existing conditions, and (3) if that state has sought and obtained the relevant waiver. Here in Michigan, our Republican governor has already stated he won’t seek such a waiver, according to reports.So why are both parties exaggerating the effects of this bill? For President Trump and congressional Republicans, the reason is obvious: They have long vowed to repeal (and replace) Obamacare, and their base expects them to get it done. For congressional Democrats, it’s an opportunity to scare and energize their base in anticipation of 2018. Neither side wants to present the AHCA for what it is—a more limited proposal to rework and reframe parts of the ACA, for better or for worse.In March, when this bill was originally scheduled to come to the floor, it was certainly “for worse.” The previous version provided few clear advantages over the ACA, yet it haphazardly added provisions to modify essential health benefits without modifying community rating—placing the sickest and most vulnerable at greater risk.Over the last month, several small but important changes were made to the bill. The current version abandons that fatally flawed approach to essential health benefits (though the new approach includes new flaws), incorporates an invisible risk sharing program, and permits limited state waivers. These changes may slightly bring down (or at least slow down the increase in) premiums for people who have seen rates go up. Even so, the AHCA becomes only marginally better than the ACA.Many have questioned the process that led up to the vote on May 4. I have publicly expressed my disgust with it. The House again operated in top-down fashion rather than as a deliberative body that respects the diversity of its membership. But it’s important to acknowledge that the bulk of this bill (123 pages) was released on March 6. Only about 15 pages were added after late March. Members of Congress were given sufficient time to read and understand the entire bill.

While an earlier version of the AHCA included a CBO score, the types of changes made to the AHCA in more recent stages render an updated score highly speculative and practically meaningless. For that score to be useful, the Congressional Budget Office would have to effectively predict which states will seek waivers, which waivers they will seek, and when they will seek them. This complex analysis of the political processes and choices of every state is beyond anyone’s capability. I weighed the lack of an updated score accordingly.When deciding whether to support a bill, I ask myself whether the bill improves upon existing law, not whether I would advocate for the policy or program if I were starting with a blank slate. In other words, the proper analysis is not whether it makes the law good but rather whether it makes the law better. In this case, I felt comfortable advancing the bill to the Senate as a marginal improvement to the ACA. The House has voted more than 30 times to amend (not just repeal) Obamacare since I’ve been in Congress, and I have supported much of that legislation, too, on the principle of incrementalism. If it advances liberty even a little (on net), then I’m a yes.Nonetheless, the ACA will continue to drive up the cost of health insurance—while bolstering the largest insurance companies—and the modifications contained in the AHCA cannot save it. Many of the AHCA’s provisions are poorly conceived or improperly implemented. At best, it will make Obamacare less bad.The Framers of the Constitution understood that federalism—the division of powers between the national and state governments—would maximize the happiness of Americans. As long as Washington dictates health insurance policy to the entire country, there will be massive tension and displeasure with the system. I’ve always said, and I will continue to say, we need to start over: Fully repeal Obamacare, let the people of each state choose their own approach, and work together in a nonpartisan manner.